Ralph Helfer (born April 9, 1931 in Chicago, Illinois) is a notable American animal behaviorist, creator of Marine World/Africa U.S.A., California, and writer of books about animals.
He was born in Chicago and had one sister, Sally. In 1942, his mother left her husband Sam and moved with her children to Hollywood, where they settled in the Green Apartments, one block off Hollywood Boulevard.
In 1955 he purchased a 1,500-acre (6.1 km2) Vasquez Rocks property to train animals, which he called Nature's Haven. He married Toni Ringo in 1962. They had a daughter, Tana Helfer. In 1962 the property was cut in half by the Antelope Valley Freeway. They relocated to Soledad Canyon. They bought 600 acres (2.4 km2) of land to build their new ranch and decided to name it Africa U.S.A.[1] Africa U.S.A. was a training compound and a provider of animals for Hollywood[2] (Clarence, the cross-eyed lion, and Judy the chimp in Daktari). The compound was also used as location for shows such as Daktari and even an episode of Star Trek "Shore Leave".[1]
During these years, Helfer created what he called "affection training," which purported to replace the whip, gun, and chair of the old-school handlers with love, understanding, and respect.[3] Critics state that affection training indeed consisted in surgically modifying (declawing and defanging) the animals and administering sedatives. Ralph Helfer denies this and stated that "this was done to animals that had deformities and were injurious to their health."
In January 1969, Africa U.S.A. was devastated by a powerful storm over Soledad Canyon which dropped large amounts of rainfall in the region. This resulted in severe flooding and mudslides in the canyons. 20 of the 1,500 animals of the ranch were killed by the torrential flooding.[1]
Ralph Helfer bought out Marine World in 1972 when it went bankrupt and added a wildlife park and "jungle theater", renaming the park as Marine World/Africa U.S.A. This park was the predecessor of Six Flags Discovery Kingdom. He also was a partner and chairman in a small Buena Park, California, theme park called Enchanted Village which was built on the site of the defunct Japanese Village and Deer Park amusement attraction. When this park went bankrupt in fall 1977 he created another company and training park called "Gentle Jungle".[3] The Gentle Jungle Affection Training School was based in Colton, California and later in Lion Country Safari, in Orange County ; finally Gentle Jungle was investigated by USDA where an eventual lawsuit against Helfer for Animal Welfare Act violations.[4] During this period he was the owner of the "human" chimp Oliver.[3] Ralph Helfer was cleared of all accusations except one, which was sent to the supreme court, which was meant to deal with the death of a tiger, who died due to a veterinarian over dosing the tiger, it never got to the supreme court as that would be the same as blaming a child's death on a parent who took their child to a doctor who miss administrated drugs to the child. Ralph Helfer left the business due to the eminence financial pressure of the wrongful suit.
In 1981, he was the writer and producer of the adventure film Savage Harvest.[5]
In the 1990s, he began a successful career as writer. Most of his books tell are non fiction life stories of famous animals. He now lives in Los Angeles and Kenya, where he leads safari tours [6] with his company Eden International Safaris and Treks.
Toni Ringo Helfer published the book The Gentle Jungle (Brigham Young University Press - 1980 - ISBN 0842517901).[7] She made the cover of TV Guide in 1968.[8] Ralph and Toni are now divorced. Ralph Helfer's current wife is now Suzzi Mutua, who works with him as safari guide at Eden International.[2][9]
Tana Helfer played the role of Kristie in Savage Harvest and was the subject of the book When you fight the tiger by Joan Hewett (Little, Brown and Company - 1984 - ISBN 0316359564).